She gave him a gentle smile. “May I ask who you are? What brings you out here?” Her eyes drifted past him. She could see only two other Hunters behind him, lingering out on the dirt road. One, a man with a long, blond beard, appeared a little drunk. The other stood perfectly still, his mismatched eyes watching her. In the light of the porch lamp, she could see he was young and thin, a boy a few years older than Jack.
The man before her leaned in. “My name is Androuet. And my friends and I are hungry.” He nodded at the others.
Isabel suspected that the rest of the Hunters must be circling around the house toward the back door. They weren’t acting like bounty hunters. They weren’t doing this for the money.
Then for what?
“I’m sorry,” she said firmly, “I only have food for one.”
“That’ll do fine.” He shoved the door open and pushed past her. She wrinkled her nose. He smelled like he hadn’t showered in a week; stale liquor and musk hung around him, clinging to his fraying uniform.
Androuet motioned to the other two Hunters to follow. The boy’s eyes caught Isabel’s as he passed, and he hesitated.
“He’s not here,” she whispered. Her fingers tightened around her robe belt. The boy didn’t make a move for his sword. He didn’t need to. He was trapped here, with the Hunters.
And trapped animals were always the most dangerous.
“Orin!” Androuet shouted from the kitchen, where he and his kinsman were rifling through the cupboards.
The boy ignored him, moving closer to Isabel. “Then where is he?” he demanded, his voice low.
“I don’t know.”
This was not the answer he sought. He slammed the front door shut, grabbed Isabel’s arm, and dragged her into the kitchen. He threw her forward. She hit the table, reinjuring the bruise on her hip. She slowly pushed herself up. This boy was much stronger than he looked.
Androuet dropped the spoon in the soup and turned around, wiping his beard on his sleeve. “What’s it going to take, m’lady Isabel?” He dropped the stranger act and moved toward her.
“I don’t know where he went.”
The drunk Hunter stood up from his seat at the table. “You’re lyin’.”
“He was here.” Androuet drew his long sword. “Jackson. And his ... friends. Where did he go?”
She glanced at the boy ... Orin. “They didn’t say,” she told him. Androuet was the one to worry about. These other two Hunters were nothing compared to what he could do.
Androuet sheathed his sword. “Now, that’s better. Who was he traveling with?”
“Two of his friends from court. And one of their Masters.”
“Good, good. Now, I know when you’re telling the truth.” He glanced at Orin and back at Isabel. “You’re his aunt, right? You were Rowan Tyler’s daughter.”
“That was a long time ago.”
He laughed, and his stinking breath washed over Isabel. “Not that long ago.”
“We found West Wind,” Orin spoke up. “Jackson is the last one.”
“I know,” she said calmly.
“You know?” Androuet took a step back. “How?” Whatever enjoyment was left in his eyes vanished into the grime that clouded his face.
“The letter.” She reached behind her and slid the letter off the table, holding it up to him.
He snatched it away. “West Wind has been secured,” she recited. “We found North.” Androuet gritted his teeth, ripped the note in half, and threw it to the floor.
Orin’s eyes lingered on the fallen letter. “He knew we were coming.”
“Who gave it to you?” Androuet shouted.
“It came by anonymous messenger,” Isabel said slowly. “I don’t know her true identity.” She looked up at him, frowning. “But…” Here was something. Here was perhaps the one card she held. “...neither do you.”
“A stranger.” Orin moved forward.
“It was an archer.” Her hand gripped the hem of her robe. Not yet. “They couldn’t catch her. The Dark Archer, they called her.”
“How did this archer find him?” Androuet demanded.
“I don’t know,” she repeated.
Orin’s voice took on a note of exasperation. “You know Jackson’s world. You were Rowan Tyler’s daughter, which means they all know you’ve known of our world for years. Which means this place—” He drew out his dagger and slammed it into the table beside her, the blade sinking deep into the wood. “—would make the perfect safe house. Jackson knew we were coming. The archer found you. How?”
She swallowed and stepped away from the table, lowering her voice. “They don’t know what happened to you, Orin,” she whispered. “Some think you’re dead. You’re South Wind, right?”
He stopped. “How did you know?”
“You haven’t any idea who the archer is, do you?”
“Enough!” Androuet shouted. He shoved Orin aside. A hot breeze ruffled through Orin’s hair as his hands clenched into tight fists. But he didn’t do anything, steeling the rising fury behind his eyes.
Then Androuet drew his sword and made a move toward Isabel. She slipped her blade from her robe and pushed herself away from the table, raising the weapon before her.
Androuet stopped. “Where is he?” His voice was rough and low.
She told herself this would happen.
Then the back door slammed open. More Hunters moved inside.
Isabel counted six sets of footsteps. She had prepared herself for this. The wind twisting around Orin grew stronger. He dropped his hands and it whipped up into a small tornado. If it came to violence, there it would end.
She took a deep breath, and gripped her sword tight. “I can’t tell you that.”
CHAPTER 11
I jerked awake. Rain pattered in the canopy of leaves above me. The fire had died out. Nick stepped out of the trees, carrying an armful of firewood. The rain began to die down, the faint glimmers of starlight shining through the trees.
Nick dumped the pile of wood down against a tree and grabbed two of the logs, moving over to the dead fire. He glanced at me, pushing his hair out of his face. I stood up, stretching my stiff muscles, and plopped down in front of the campfire. He set the logs on the ashes and crouched down.
“Not very good at this whole ‘surviving in the woods’ thing, are we?” I yawned.
He glanced up at me. “You probably want to move back a bit.” I scooted back a good five feet. Nick spread his fingers over the wood as if warming his hands. Instead, lightning flashed over his skin, crisscrossing his face with flickering shadows. The electricity shot down to the dry logs. The bark began to smoke, thin tendrils rising through Nick’s cold, flickering light. Suddenly the wood burst into flame. Nick jerked back as fire burst into the sky.
“Nice.” I grabbed a stick off the ground and chucked it at him. He caught it in a flash of lightning. Ash drifted from his fingers. “Alright.” I yawned, turning back to the fire. “That was a little more violent than was necessary. But cool,” I admitted.
Nick sat down, crossing his legs on the forest floor. The darkness in his eyes faded to a smile.
I looked around. Natanian was awake. He dropped his blanket off his shoulders and sat down between us. “That looked easy,” he quipped.
Nick leaned back, “Well, you do it next time.” Natanian reached forward, ice curling up his fingers. Nick slapped his arm away. “Hey. Hands off.”
“If Kara was here, she would show you how it’s really done.” He grinned at Nick, then shot a glance in my direction.
I laughed. “She’d have no problem out here.” Sadness started to creep over me. I’d grown up with Kara … when her fire manifested six months ago, she seemed to get a new wave of confidence. All her sarcasm turned up to ten….
I sighed. The flames flared with a pop, sending a cloud of sparks that twisted together up into the night sky before they disappeared, fading into the stars. The clouds were almost gone, the sky clear, the stars bright. I suddenly r
emembered the satchel Aunt Isabel had given me—my grandfather’s. I reached behind me and grabbed it from where it leaned against a tree.
“What’s that?” Natanian moved closer.
“Probably a dragon egg,” I answered.
Nick looked up in curiosity. “Doubtful.”
“You’re right. It’s probably a tiny elf.” I flipped open the satchel, running my fingers along the embroidered name on the hem. Rowan Tyler.
“I was thinking more of a tiny cursed elf,” Nick elaborated.
“Ah-ha!” I yanked out a stack of photographs and set the satchel aside.
“Well that was anticlimactic.” Natanian shrugged and sat back.
“What are they?” Nick asked.
“They’re … of my grandpa.” I tilted my head. I recognized his eyes, his smile. I’d never actually seen photos of him this young.
The first was a picture of three young men, dressed in their mottled green Áccyn uniforms, swords strapped to their sides. Two of the soldiers carried longbows, and a quiver sat at their feet. The guy on the right had to be my grandpa.
“Is he as clumsy as you?” Nick asked. Natanian waved at him to shut up.
Grandpa Tyler had the same hair as me, the same chin. His blue and brown eyes sparkled even in this old photo, the exact same shades as mine. I saw the glint of a chain around his neck. I touched my chest, feeling that same cold, silver chain against my skin. He must not have been much older than me in this picture, if he still needed the vial to control his power. He was True Born too, which meant he, too, had probably been in danger wherever he went. Those of us who carried the power of the Golden Arrow curse the strongest … who had the power of the eleven guardians … we True Borns seemed to lead a trail of bad. Everything was stronger around us. Those who sought our power sent their best-of-the-best after us.
They found me. I got away from Fort Calmier, and the Hunters found me. I couldn’t escape. I was on the run. I took a deep breath, calming the thoughts swirling in my head. The cold breeze around me died to a gentle whisper. What would happen if these Hunters caught up to me? They needed me … or maybe my power … but how far would they go to get me?
I looked back down at the picture. There was no fear in my grandpa’s eyes. I had hardly been able to shake that fear since my Manifestation. But that same courage he’d held, that same blood flowed in me now. That same excitement.
I flipped to the next picture. I saw Grandpa Tyler at about the same age, sword drawn, raised in front of him. He was giving a death-stare into the camera, his mismatched eyes more pronounced than ever. I could still hear his voice in my head. “Jackson Laudius Marcrombie, the Great Guardian of the North.” Is that what they called him? The ‘Great Guardian of the North’?
The next photo was of him sitting on a log in the forest, in front of Fort Calmier, beside a girl … my grandma. There was also another of the boys from the first photo. Grandpa was older here, probably eighteen or nineteen. A deep scar crossed his arm. But his eyes sparkled.
I looked past him, to the torch-lit battlements of Fort Calmier rising above the trees, shrouded by fog remnants of the magic used to keep the castle hidden. He walked the same halls I walked, ate in the same hall in which I ate. He served his court.
The fire sparked and crackled, the only sound on the edge of these woods. I tugged the chain from beneath my shirt and gripped the vial tight, feeling the coolness in my hand, seeing the gray mist swirl beneath my fingers. The Hunters would still come after me, so long as the Ealdra held their cards. I didn’t know what those cards showed. I didn’t know why they needed my power.
But I was strong. Robin Hood’s blood flowed through my veins. I had the power of the North Wind inside me. I would learn to control it. I would stand up against these monsters, no matter what the fear screaming inside me said.
I looked up. Golden light was breaking on the horizon, shooting across the sky in fiery rays. “Look,” I said quietly, “the sunrise.”
“Come on,” Natanian said. “I have an idea for you to begin learning control.” He painfully stood up and motioned for Nick and me to follow him.
I dropped the photos back in Grandpa’s satchel and slung it over my shoulder, then strode after them across the forest floor.
CHAPTER 12
We emerged from the tree line. A wide river twisted down the hillside before us. Cold wind whistled past. Natanian moved forward, kneeling beside the river bank.
“Light ’em up, Nick.”
“Um … are you sure about this?” I took a cautious step backward as Nick moved forward.
He knelt on the river bank and rubbed his hands together. Sparks of electricity flashed up his arms. He touched his fingers to the surface, and lightning burst through the water. A cloud of steam billowed up. Nick jerked back. Natanian threw out his hand, freezing the steam into tiny ice crystals, holding them, hovering, in midair.
“Blow it away,” he encouraged, a mischievous grin spreading across his face. I shivered in the cold.
“You gonna shock me too?” I asked Nick. He raised his hands and stepped back, smiling at the look on my face. I shook my head. “Love this.” I breathed out and raised my hands. I thrust them toward the snow cloud. Nothing happened, other than a few crystals curling away with the ever-present breeze around me.
“You can’t learn to move what you can’t even grasp,” came a voice.
I turned around.
Bancroft strode out of the tree line. Natanian dropped his arms, and the ice crystals drifted down, settling on the grass at his feet. Another gust of Montana wind whistled past. I breathed in the crisp, cold air, fueling the energy in my chest. My own small vortex picked up speed.
“Can’t I just run at things?” I offered. “Spin things away, you know?”
“Sit down.”
“Yes, Master.” I sighed, glancing at Natanian with a shrug.
I sat with my eyes closed on the cold grass on the cold ground for what seemed like hours, trying to calm myself enough to bring my power under total control.
“Remind me again why we’re up in Montana?” Natanian groaned, his breath puffing in little clouds.” I tried to shut their conversation out, focusing on my own breath, on the cold tingle in my chest.
“Jack’s power is strongest out in the open, in the cold, where the wind is unbound by trees or stone. Here is the perfect place for him to train. If he can learn to control his power when he is the strongest, it will be easier when he is weakest. It’s the perfect place for him to learn to contain it.”
I took a deep breath, spreading my fingers in the grass.
“Say, buried alive,” Nick explained sarcastically.
I cracked one eye open, grabbed off my shoe, and threw it at him.
* * *
“Again!” Bancroft shouted. I clenched my fists tight, shifting my weight on the dry ground. Nick sat a little ways away, watching. Natanian flashed me a mischievous smirk through his hovering cloud of snow.
I focused on the crystals again, reaching for the ice-cold feeling in my chest, and thrust my hand forward. I took a deep breath, and tried again. And again. Nothing happened. Great shock.
* * *
I was standing on the top of the hill by camp, the river rushing past before me. There was nothing around us for miles.
“Feel that power inside you,” Bancroft said, “Let it flow through every inch of your body.” He was pacing around me again. I stared at that stupid cloud of snow hovering around Natanian, and felt the familiar cold chill race out from my chest to my fingers. “Hold onto it. Don’t let it go.”
“I’m holding onto it,” I muttered through gritted teeth, glaring at the cloud.
“Don’t mess up,” Nick encouraged.
I concentrated with all my might on that stupid cloud, ignoring Nick, blocking out everything else. Just like I had done every other day.
“Just don’t think about it,” Natanian suggested.
“Easy for you to say.”
&nb
sp; “Any time now,” Natanian needled me.
“Can you all just shut up and let me focus?” I asked, frustrated. “Please?”
Natanian laughed. “You’re doing terrible.” Bancroft shot him a glare. “I mean great,” he muttered, the cloud of snow rising a little higher around him.
I closed my eyes. Come on, Jack. You can do this. Grandpa Tyler had done it. I breathed out. I could see him again in my memory. I felt the cold ground beneath my feet, the wind against my skin. I smiled to myself. I could hear him tell the grand tales he claimed were of Robin Hood—which I was realizing, more and more, were half his own adventures. I could hear the rushing stream, feel the cold mist on my skin, rushing down my lungs. One day, he said.
I thrust my hand forward. The cloud of snow burst apart. Natanian’s eyes widened in surprise. He slowly lowered his hands. The snow flew in streaks across the hill, melting into the air behind him.
Gray mist curled down my arms.
“YES!” I shouted.
After that, things started happening much faster. I could manipulate that stupid cloud of ice however I wanted. Bancroft would chuck sticks at me to deflect. Natanian turned up his power, sending a spray of tiny ice shards. I had to throw up a shield to stop them. But I could only control small things. If I tried anything against a person, all I would accomplish would be ruffling his hair.
The hardest part was when I got spooked or nervous or scared, or even laughed too hard; then we would end up with a small tornado of air conditioning around us.
CHAPTER 13
We had moved again, keeping on the run from the Hunters. We were up in Canada … I think.
I sat with the others around a roaring campfire we’d actually managed to keep going this time. Tall, dark trees rose around us, their branches twisting into the air, glistening with frost.
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